Posted on 03/06/2005 1:01:04 PM PST by Hugenot
Senator Edward Kennedy (D, MA) has just returned from Lourdes a believer, or at least viewers of This Week with George Stephanopoulos might be inclined to think so after watching his interview with the Senator.
This time there was no haughty lecture on the separation of Church and State when Stephanopoulos asked him about the impact of his faith on his politics. I read the New Testament too, the flustered Senator from Chappaquiddick protested as he bumbled about his faith and his family.
My father made nine First Fridays for twenty-six years, he said as he praised his mothers devotion.
He rather sloppily referred to the teachings of Mark, which say that we will be judged on the way we treat the poor and marginalized (actually Matthew 25, although there are some interesting things about divorce and re-marriage in Marks Gospel) and went on to speak about his Catholic faith as a religion of hope and resurrection.
In other words, his last visit to a Church (apart from campaign stops) was for a funeral.
Republicans take note. As Democrats scramble to cut their losses on religious issues, witless Republicans like Christie Whitman lament that the Republican Party has been hijacked by religious conservatives.
The 2004 election proved that the Republicans need cultural conservatives to win on the national level. Senator Kennedys stammering about the importance of his faith only confirms what should be obvious to the most casual observer.
Something wrong with the Old Testament?
How much gin has Unca Teddy turned back into water?
I can just see ol' Uncle Teddy, flipping through the pages in a drunken haze, muttering under his breath, "There's gotta be a loophole somewhere in here..."
Well.....Ol'Teddy couldn't get "10 things" right in the first place.....LOL...............
I believe the Democrats found 'religion' about, as I recall, 2:10 AM Nov 3, 2004.
That is when FOX NEWS called Ohio for President Bush.
IOW, because his father was a devout catholic, one must conclude that he is too. Actions speak louder than words, Senator.
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Good insight and excellent point!
His father? A devout Catholic?
HA!!!
What a laugh...his concern for the poor.
Here on Cape Cod, everyone knows the the family doesn't give a rat's @ss about the poor. They're
always slow to pay the bills of "working stiffs" who might have done work for them.
Nothing wrong at all. In fact Dean's favorite part of the Bible (New Testement) is the story of Jonah and the whale. I think Gov. Dean's Jewish wife thinks so too.
Teddy loves the part about turning water into wine.
On this man and this subject, recall Ambrose Bierce's biblical parody about an earlier senator... " A clod by day and a pillar of firewater by night "
John Kerry taking a leap of faith in another modernist and experimental theological direction.
"Hey, I learned this at Yale in the Skull&Bones classes..."
You're right. Bush is crucified by the press if he says anything about his faith. Kennedy gets away with it because the Libs know he doesn't really mean it. They understand the game he is playing.
Yep. He read it, got deeply inspired, and started trying to turn water into whiskey. So far, with no success without yeast and sugary substances.
Our Lord did speak about the poor but not the mateialistic poor. He spoke many times of the poor in spirit.
maginalized? My concordance doesn't have a verse for that word...
Anyway, back to the point. So did the spiritually renewed Senator open his house to the homeless? Set up a food kitchen with his own money? List his pocessions on ebay so he could give the money to the poor?
Or is he reviewing government programs to see which ones should get more taxpayer (someone else's) funding?
hhmmm oh, pooh! I'll write and ask him myself!!
"The just treatment of the poor is central to both Judaism and Christianity."
No, our sin, and need for a Savior, provided for us only in the Messiah, is central.
Anyone can feed the poor. Only Christians do it because Jesus promised to live inside them and work through them, so that their works are actually God's works, and He gets the glory.
Trying to act "justly" is meaningless outside of understanding what justice is. Would it be "just" of God to favor you because you feed the poor and do certain things? HE says no, because the price has been paid by Christ alone. He says we can never do enough in His holy sight, because our hearts are evil. And yet in His love and grace He provides a way for us to have His favor: His spotless Lamb of God, His Only Son, taking our punishment, dying in our place, so that we are no longer under His condemnation if we believe in Jesus.
We can't understand justice, until we understand right and wrong. Feeding the poor by someone who rejects Christ, earns no favor in God's sight. Someone who trusts in Jesus' death for them, does not gain favor with God by feeding the poor. They have favor only because of Christ. They feed the poor out of gratitude to Him and a new love for others. Feeding the poor, but not doing it from faith, defined by God as believing in Christ alone for salvation, is sin. "Whatever is not of faith, is sin."
Jesus Christ and His reconciling us with the Father is what is "central" to the teachings of the Bible. Until we understand that, all other views we have get skewed wrongly.
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